MANSFIELD – The smell of dust, burning rubber and the sulfur of fireworks was in the air all afternoon and evening at Mansfield Speedway.
The speedway hosted its Freedom 250 Festival from noon to 9 p.m., bringing in the community to celebrate the Fourth of July and the nation’s semiquincentennial anniversary.
The midway was lined with vendors and vintage cars, with the track opening up for races of variety later on at the Crall Road dirt track facility, re-opened this year by Matt and Jordan Tifft.
Community members lined their cars up on the midway, hoods popped so viewers could admire the engines. The cars at the show ranged from modern to classic, from race cars to monster trucks.
It was a gear-head dream come true on the day Americans around the country celebrated the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
The Buckeye Bakery Battle of the Bangers was the first of those races, pitting three high school teachers from north central Ohio against one another.
Mansfield Senior High School, Madison Comprehensive High School and Heartland Tech Educational Center in Ashland County were represented. The drivers, teachers of their respective automobile programs, raced cars built by their students.
Zach Lozier, the winner of the race and the auto body technical instructor, took home the prize pool of $1,750.
“I couldn’t be here without the people who sponsored the car, and my students who helped build it,” said Lozier, who teaches at Heartland Tech. “A lot has been going into this. I’ve been super nervous to do it. I always wanted to try it.”
The speedway also hosted a powder-puff race for inexperienced female drivers who work at the track. They also held monster truck tug-of-war, followed by a “cops and robbers” race, which included an off-duty Mansfield Police Department officer racing around the speedway in a dirt track car.
A hot dog eating contest followed races, out on the midway, as the last major event before fireworks. The winner consumed about 10 hot dogs and buns in five minutes.
The firework show after the sun went down saw crowds lining up on all sides of the speedway, even miles out, just to get a good look at the show that would end in a fiery, planned, explosion.
(Below are photos from the Freedom 250 Festival on Saturday at Mansfield Speedway.)
